It has been consistent in the electronics industry that complex logic functions are integrated into smaller and smaller form factors. For instance, a popular growing trend is to combine audio and telephone capabilities in one device, including graphic and video functions in a computer chipset, and to integrate all computer peripheral functions into a single IO chip. A related general trend in the PC industry is the migration of more and more devices, components, functionality, etc. to the motherboard. This makes sense for a variety of engineering and cost reasons, including the fact that this approach conserves available conventional expansion slots on the system bus, is easier to configure, reduces the total mother board form factor and BOM cost, and preserves compatibility with legacy systems.
At the same time, there are certain components that are not optimally combined or tightly integrated together for a variety of reasons, some of which are engineering related, and some of which are regulatory related. As noted above, there is considerable interest in placing a fall scale modem down (directly on) the motherboard, to obtain the aforementioned benefits. From an engineering perspective, however, it is difficult to place the analog I/O portions of a modem directly on a motherboard because of various noise sources present on the latter. Therefore, the signal to noise ratio (SNR) performance of the modem system will decrease. Similarly, from a regulatory perspective, these analog portions of a modem must undergo a certification process in accordance with local applicable telecom rules and regulations before they can be implemented in a commercial product. If it were necessary to subject every motherboard to a new certification process (simply because it now incorporated some modem front end circuitry), this would impede and slow down the development of new products considerably.
Thus, there is a general perception in the industry at this time that, at least for the PC environment, it makes more sense to separate the analog and digital portions of a high speed modem. This has led to a proposal, authored by Intel Corporation, known as the Audio/Modem Riser Specification, in which it is suggested that the analog I/O portions of a modem be moved to a card that is physically separated but easily connected to a motherboard. Version 1.1 of this document, revised on Sep. 10, 1998, is available for downloading via the Internet at Intel's corporate web site, and is hereby incorporated by reference. In this specification, a portion of which is reproduced in FIG. 1A, it is proposed that the portions of the modem which are susceptible to noise, and which implicate certification issues, be moved to what is known as a Homologated Riser Card. This card has I/O connections to the outside world (i.e., such as to a conventional telephone line) but at the same time fits in a riser connector directly to the motherboard. As the specification indicates, this riser interface is preferably standardized, so the motherboard makers can implement audio/modem capability with lower BOM costs, and with fewer concerns about vendor proprietary variations (i.e., because there is a common footprint that can be stuffed with competing pin compatible implementations). The specification provides a detailed and comprehensive explanation of the electrical and physical requirements required to comply with the proposed standard.
As depicted in FIG. 1A, a modem 100 includes an analog I/O portion 110 located on a riser card 111. This analog I/O portion (sometimes referred to as a codec) is then interfaced through a digital link 120 (known as AC-97) to the digital controller 130 of the modem. The latter digital portion is located directly on a motherboard 131 and generally includes appropriate modem control circuitry, data pumps, and other functional circuits typically associated with those aspects of a modem. These functions can also be performed, for example, by a so-called host signal processing (HSP) embodiment, in which case the AC 97 digital controller (at least for the modem portions anyway) can consist of as little as a very simple bus interface. The preferred implementation for this digital portion is described in another specification published by Intel known as Audio Codec 97. Version 2.1 of this document, published on May 22, 1998, is likewise available for downloading at Intel's corporate web site, and is also hereby incorporated by reference. As noted therein, the AC97 digital controller can include a wide range of capabilities, including multiple digital audio channels, and suitable interfaces to a PCI bus, a digital I2S bus, etc.
A description of the various I/O, control, and power/ground signals in the AC-97 link passing through the riser interface is provided at Tables 1-5 of the aforementioned A/M Riser specification. As seen generally in FIG. 1B, in a voice band modem implementation, the AC 97 link between the digital controller 130 and the analog CODEC 110 consists of a five wire, bi-directional, serial TDM format interface. The signals supported, include the following: RESET (a master hardware reset), BITCLK (12.288 MHz serial data clock), SYNC (48 KHz fixed rate sample sync), SDATA_OUT (serial, time division multiplexed input data stream to the PC), and SDATA_IN (serial, time division multiplexed output data stream from the PC). The format and nature of these signals is well-known, and is described in the aforementioned specifications. Digital controller 130 can also including suitable interfaces for other contemporary expansion busses, such as PCI bus 141, USB 142, etc.
While the A/M Riser specification is a step in the right direction, it does not provide for functionality that would permit implementation of an xDSL type modem at this time. For example, xDSL requires a much higher bit rate than that provided by the AC97 link (at a 2.2 MHz sampling and 16 bits wide for an ADSL downstream signal, the total bit rate is 35.2 Mb/s, which is much higher than the 12.288 MHz serial clock). Furthermore, there are various power and control signaling requirements in xDSL that were not foreseen by AC97. Therefore, the AC97 and A/M Riser specification are limited to supporting at most simple analog type (V.90 and the like) modems. This is a significant drawback, since xDSL technologies (and especially ADSL) are expected to be in widespread use in a very short time.